Jackie Stewart's First F1 Victory: 50 Years Ago at the 1965 Italian Grand Prix

This weekend, Formula One returns to one of its spiritual homes, the Autodromo Nazionale Monza, for the Italian Grand Prix.

Fifty years ago, on September 12, 1965, a 26-year-old rookie British Racing Motors (BRM) driver named Jackie Stewart took his first career victory on the same track.

When the teams arrived at Monza that year after a month-and-a-half summer break, there was little hint that Stewart or BRM would have such a memorable weekend. Lotus' Jim Clark had won six of the first seven races of the season, only missing out on Monaco—won by Stewart's team-mate, Graham Hill—because he did not enter the race. He and Lotus boss Colin Chapman were busy winning the Indianapolis 500 that weekend.

Still, Stewart's sublime talent was already apparent, having finished second to Clark (and ahead of his world champion team-mate) at the Belgian, French and Dutch Grands Prix.

"I haven't a clue," Stewart responded when asked by journalist Robert Daley how he could drive so quickly in Daley's book, The Cruel Sport. "I don't know anything about my car, I just get in it and drive it."

Clark had clinched the drivers' championship before the break at the German Grand Prix, but Stewart, who was sharing a London apartment with his fellow Scotsman that year, remembered, "It was actually a tough year for him. He ran himself almost into the ground because he was going back and forward from Indianapolis to race over here—practice, qualifying and then the race," per the Daily Mail's John Greechan.

At Monza, Clark easily qualified on pole, two-tenths of a second ahead of John Surtees' Ferrari and 0.7 seconds up on Stewart in third.

It rained on Sunday morning, but by the time the race started at 3:30 in the afternoon, the sun had reappeared and dried the track, according to Denis Jenkinson's report for Motor Sport Magazine.

At the start, Surtees dropped back with a clutch problem, while Clark, Stewart and Hill (who was fourth on the grid) pulled away quickly, slipstreaming one another.

In Stewart's autobiography, Winning Is Not Enough, he described the Monza circuit of the 1960s:

This was not the Monza circuit of today, punctuated by a series of chicanes to reduce speed. This was the high-speed circuit through the wooded royal park where the lead could change four or five times during a lap, where you could pass or be passed before or after Curva Grande or before Curva di Lesmos, or at Ascari, or at the Parabolica and perhaps eight cars would be slipstreaming, taking advantage of the drag produced by the air pockets, racing nose to tail and wheel to wheel.

The group at the front shared the lead back and forth, with Surtees eventually recovering from his slow start, to the delight of the tifosi, Ferrari's fanatical supporters.

The Italian circuit was fast and dangerous, particularly with so many cars running so close together at high speed. Just four years earlier, on the second lap of the race on the run down to the Parabolica, Wolfgang von Trips collided with Clark, sending the German count's Ferrari careening up an earth bank and into a crowd of spectators. Fifteen died in addition to Von Trips.

1965 Italian Grand Prix at Monza. Jim Clark, Jackie Stewart, Graham Hill and Dan Gurney drift through the Parabolica pic.twitter.com/hhGBD3jVbr

— McLaren Soul (@McLaren_Soul) August 27, 2014

On Lap 34 of 76, Surtees' faulty clutch finally forced him into retirement, leaving Dan Gurney, Lorenzo Bandini and Mike Spence to chase the leaders. Then, on Lap 64, with Clark sitting in third behind the two BRMs, his Lotus suffered an electrical problem and he stopped on the track, promoting Gurney to third.

The Italian crowd cheered Clark's retirement, according to The Times, happy that, "at least it was not to be another run away win for 'Clarkissimo'."

As soon as Clark dropped out, Stewart recalled in his autobiography, BRM engineer Tony Rudd, "started to signal from the pit wall that we should ease off and consolidate our control of the race. ... However, to Tony's frustration, the more we 'eased off', the faster our laps became."

With Hill, the senior member of the team, leading at that point, it looked like he would be able to cruise home for his second victory of the season.

But Stewart kept pushing. "I did not know what the hell to do out there," Stewart admitted to Daley in The Cruel Sport. Should he back off and let his team leader take the win, or keep the hammer down with his first grand prix victory in sight?

In the end, Hill made the decision for him. On the second-to-last lap, he slid wide at the Parabolica and touched the gravel at the edge of the circuit. Stewart passed him and grabbed the lead, hanging on until the chequered flag.

The win helped Stewart to a third-place finish in the drivers' championship in his rookie year, behind only Clark and Hill.

After the race, a somewhat surprised Stewart told The Times, "I never thought I would get so far this year—I had set out really just to learn my way very carefully."

Of course, that Italian Grand Prix 50 years ago was just the beginning for Stewart. He would go on to win 27 races in his career and three world championships, in 1969, 1971 and 1973.

I asked Chris Amon, who was racing for Parnell in 1965 but missed the race at Monza, about Stewart's win. He responded via email that the Scotsman's victory "was certainly no surprise. His great talent was very obvious to most, but to those that knew him I think what struck most was his determination to succeed and, for want of better words, the work ethic he showed in pursuit of his career. I think it was this that led to him achieving so much of his success."

As the fans poured onto the track at the end of the race, they called out, "Il Grande Jackie, il Grande Jackie," Stewart wrote in his autobiography. Italian Ferrari fans cheering for a Scottish driver in a BRM.

But hey, at least it wasn't another win for Clark.

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